"Delicate was her shape; fair her skin; and her body well proportioned: her bosom was as smooth as a mirror, "Or like the pure egg of an ostrich, of a yellowish tint blended with white." Also the Koran :-"Near them shall lie the virgins of Paradise, refraining their looks from beholding any besides their spouses, having large black eyes, and resembling the eggs of an ostrich, covered with feathers from dust.”— Moallakat, p. 8. Al Koran, ch. 27. But though the Arabian epithet be taken from thence, yet the word ivory is substituted, as more analogous to European ideas, and not foreign from the Eastern. Thus Amru: "And two sweet breasts, smooth and white as vessels of ivory, modestly defended from the hand of those who presume to touch them." - Moallakat, p. 77. PAGE 45.-baths of rose-water. The use of perfumed waters for the purpose of bathing is of an early origin in the East, where every odoriferous plant sheds a richer fragrance than is known to our more humid climates. The rose which yields this lotion is, according to Hasselquist, of a beautiful pale blush colour, double, large as a man's fist, and more exquisite in scent than any other species. The quantities of this water distilled annually at Fajhum, and carried to distant countries, is immense. The mode of conveying it is in vessels of copper coated with wax. -Voyag. p. 248. Ben Jonson makes Volpone say to Celia,— "Their bath shall be the juyce of gillyflowres, Grand Cairo, whose Thus, in the story of Alraoui :-"There was an emir of company was no less coveted for his genius than his rank. melancholy mood, he turned towards a courtier, and said: 'Alraoui, my heart is dejected, and I know not the cause; relate to me some pleasant story, to dispel my chagrin. Alraoui replied: "The great have with reason regarded tales as the best antidote to care; if you will allow me, I will tell you my own.'”. Translated from one of the unpublished MSS. mentioned in the Preface. "The Arabian Nights," saith Colonel Capper, in his Observations on the Passage to India through Egypt and across the great Desert, " are by many people supposed to be a spurious production, and are therefore slighted in a manner they do not deserve. They are written by an Arabian, and are universally read and admired throughout Asia, by persons of all ranks, both old and young. Considered, therefore, as an original work, descriptive as, they are of the manners and customs of the East in general, and also of the genius and character of the Arabians in particular, they surely must be thought to merit the attention of the curious; nor are they, in my opinion, entirely destitute of merit in other respects; for although the extravagance of some of the stories is carried too far, yet, on the whole, one cannot help admiring the fancy and invention of Likewise, Tasso: egli rivolse I cupidi occhi in quelle membra belle, Aminta, iii. I. the author, in striking out such a variety of pleasing incidents. Pleasing, I call them, because they have frequently afforded me much amusement; nor do I envy any man his feelings who is above being pleased with them; but, before any person decides on the merit of these books, he should be eye-witness of the effects they produce on those who best understand them. I have, more than once, seen the Arabians on the Desert, sitting round a fire, listening to these stories with such attention and pleasure, as totally to forget the fatigue and hardship with which, an instant before, they were totally overcome. In short, they are held in the same estimation all over Asia as the adventures of Don Quixote are in Spain." If the observation of the Knight of la Mancha, respecting translation in general, be just,-"me parece, que el traducir de una lengua en otra, es como quien mira los tapices flamencos por el reves, que aunque se ven las figuras, son llenas de hilos que las escurecen, y no se ven con la lisura y tez de la haz,” the wrong side of tapestry will represent more truly the figures on the right, notwithstanding the floss that blurs them, than any version the precision and smoothness of the Arabian surface. The prospect of a rich country in all the glories of summer is not more different from its November appearance than the original of those tales when opposed to the French translation, of which, it may be added, our version is, at best, but a moonlight view : "pallida la luna Tingea d'un lume scolorito e incerto La vasta solitudine terrena." PAGE 45.-lamb à la crême. No dish among the Easterns was more generally admired. The caliph Abdolmelek, at a splendid entertainment, to which whoever came was welcome, asked Amrou, the son of Hareth, what kind of meat he preferred to all others. The old man answered, "An ass's neck, well seasoned and roasted."-"But what say you," replied the caliph, "to the leg or shoulder of a LAMB à la crême ?" and added,― "How sweetly we live if a shadow would last!" -M. S. Laud. Numb. 161. A. Ockley's Hist. of the Saracens, vol. ii. p. 277. PAGE 45.-made the dwarfs dance against their will. Ali Chelebi al Moufti, in a treatise on the subject, held that dancing, after the example of the derviches, who made it a part of their devotion, was allow able. But in this opinion he was deemed to be heterodox; for Mahometans, in general, place dancing amongst the things that are forbidden. — D'Herbelot, p. 98. PAGE 45. — durst not refuse the commander of the faithful. 1 The mandates of Oriental potentates have ever been accounted irresistible. Hence the submission of these devotees to the will of the caliph. — Esther, i. 19. Daniel, vi. 8. Ludeke Expos. brevis, p. 60. PAGE 45.-he spread himself on the sofa. The idiom of the original occurs in Euripides, and is from him adopted by Milton: Ιδελε τον Γεροντ' απ ΧΥΜΕΝΟΝ· ω ταλας. Heraclide, v. 75. "See how he lies at random, carelessly diffus'd, With languish'd head unpropt, As one past hope, abandon'd And by himself given over." Sampson, v. 118. PAGE 46.-properly lubricated with the balm of Mecca. Unguents, for reasons sufficiently obvious, have been of general use in hot climates. According to Pliny, "at the time of the Trojan war, they consisted of oils perfumed with the odours of flowers, and chiefly of ROSES," whence the 'POAOEN λcesov of Homer. Hasselquist speaks of oil impregnated with the tuberose and jessamine; but the unguent here mentioned was preferred to every other. Lady M. W. Montagu, desirous to try its effects, seems to have suffered materially from having improperly applied it. PAGE 46.-if their eyebrows and tresses were in order. As perfuming and decorating the hair of the sultanas was an essential duty of their attendants, the translator hath ventured to substitute the term tresses for another more exact to the original. In Don Quixote, indeed, a waiting woman of the duchess mentions the same services with our author, but as performed by persons of her own sex:-"Hay en Candaya mugeres que andan de casa en casa á quitar el vello, y á pulir las cejas, y hacer otros menjurges tocantes a mugeres, nosotras las dueñas de mi señora por jamas quisímos admitirlas, porque las mas oliscan á tarceras." Tom. iv. cap. xl. p. 42. Other offices of the dressing-room and toilet may be seen in Lucian, vol. ii. Amor. 39. p. 441. The Arabians had a preparation of antimony and galls, with which they tinged the eyebrows of a beautiful black; and great pains were taken to shape them into regular arches. In combing the hair, it was customary to sprinkle it with perfumes, and to dispose it in a variety of becoming forms. Richardson's Dissertat. p. 481. Lady M. W. Montagu's Letters. PAGE 46.the nine hundred and ninety-ninth time. The Mahometans boast of a doctor who is reported to have read over the Koran not fewer than twenty thousand times. — D'Herbelot, p. 75. PAGE 46.-black eunuchs, sabre in hand. In this manner the apartments of the ladies were constantly guarded. Thus, in the Story of the Enchanted Horse, Firouz Schah, traversing a strange palace by night, entered a room, "and by the light of a lantern saw that the persons he had heard snoring were black eunuchs with naked sabres by them, which was enough to inform him that this was the guard-chamber of some queen or princess."Arabian Nights, vol. iv. p. 189. PAGE 47.-Nouronihar, daughter of the Emir, was sprightly as an antelope, and full of wanton gaiety. Solomon has compared his bride to "a company of horses in Pharaoh's chariots;" Horace, a sportive young female to an untamed filly; Sophocles, a delicate virgin to a wild heifer; Ariosto, Angelica to a fawn or kid; and Tasso, Erminia to a hind; but the object of resemblance adopted by our author, is of superior beauty to them all. PAGE 47.-to let down the great swing. The swing was an exercise much used in the apartments of the Eastern ladies, and not only contributed to their health, but also to their amusement. -Tales of Inatulla, vol. i. p. 259. PAGE 47.-I accept the invitation of your honied lips. Uncommon as this idiom may appear in our language, it was not so, either to the Hebrew or the Greek. Compare Proverbs xvi. 24. An Arabian fabulist, enumerating the charms of a consummate beauty, hath used the identical expression of our author; but, probably, in an extended sense. as, PAGE 47. " from her lip Not words alone pleased him." -my senses are dazzled with the radiance that beams from your charms, Or (to express an idiom for which we have no substitute), thy countenance, rayonnante de beautés et de graces. Descriptions of this kind are frequent in Arabian writers; thus, Tarafa: "Her face appears to be wrapped in a veil of sun-beams." And, in the Arabian Nights: "Schemselnihar came forward amongst her attendants with a majesty resembling the sun amidst the clouds; which receive his splendour, without concealing his lustre." To account for this compliment in the mouth of Bababalouk, we should remember that he was, ex officio, elegans formarum Spectator. PAGE 48.-melodious Philomel, I am thy rose. The passion of the nightingale for the rose is celebrated over all the East. Thus Mesihi, as translated by Sir W. Jones: K "Come, charming maid, and hear thy poet sing, Be gay too soon the flowers of spring will fade." PAGE 48.-oil spilt in breaking the lamps. It appears from Thevenot that illuminations were usual on the arrival of a stranger, and he mentions, on an occasion of this sort, two hundred lamps be ing lighted. The quantity of oil, therefore, spilt by Bababalouk may be easilaccounted for from this custom. PAGE 48.-reclining on down. See Lady M. W. Montagu. Let. xxvi. PAGE 49.- calenders. These were a sort of men amongst the Mahometans who abandoned father and mother, wife and children, relations and possessions, to wander through the world, under a pretence of religion, entirely subsisting on the fortuitous bounty of those they had the address to dupe. — D'Herbelot, Suppl. p. 204. PAGE 49.-santons. A body of religionists, who were also called abdals, and pretended to be inspired with the most enthusiastic raptures of divine love. They were regarded by the vulgar as saints. — Olearius, tom. i. p. 971. D'Herbelot, p. 5. PAGE 49.- derviches. The term dervich signifies a poor man, and is the general appellation by which a religious amongst the Mahometans is named. There are, however, discriminations that distinguish this class from the others already mentioned. They are bound by no vow of poverty, they abstain not from marriage, and, whenever disposed, they may relinquish both their blue shirt and profession. - D'Herbelot, Suppl. 214.-It is observable, that these different orders, though not established till the reign of Nasser al Samani, are notwithstanding mentioned by our author as coeval with Vathek, and by the author of the Arabian Nights, as existing in the days of Haroun al Raschid; so that the Arabian fabulists appear as inattentive to chronological exactness in points of this sort as our immortal dramatist himself. These constituted the principal caste of the Indians, according to whose doctrine Brahma, from whom they are called, is the first of the three created beings by whom the world was made. This Brahma is said to have communicated to the Indians four books, in which all the sciences and ceremonies of their religion are comprised. The word Brahma, in the Indian language, signifies pervading all things. The Brahmins lead a life of most rigid abstinence, refraining not only from the use, but even the touch, of animal food; and are equally exemplary for their contempt of pleasures and devotion to philosophy and religion. - D'Herbelot, p. 212. Bruckeri Hist. Philosoph. tom. i. p. 194. |